New Products and Publications

From AnnickTorrie and the Snake-Prince
by K.V. Johansen
illustrated by Christine Delezenne

Silver Birch Award 2008 finalist, OLA

“The Year’s Best” List, Resource Links

The moment Torrie meets the pedlar Wren, he knows her talents are destined for more than the beautiful ornaments she makes from scraps of wire and feathers. When Crown Prince Liasis is kidnapped and no one steps forward to attempt a rescue, both Torrie and Wren realize it’s time to act. And so the two pick up the trail, even as the prince—transformed into a snake and held captive by a sorcerer—plots his own escape by winning a friend among his captor’s goblin followers. Wren and Torrie travel through the mountains and into the Wild Forest, where they must deal with a goblin spy, an irate and deadly dryad, and the puzzle of Rookfeather the minstrel. And when they finally reach their goal, Wren discovers surprising truths about herself and the strangely powerful ornaments she makes to sell. Therein lies the secret to freeing the prince and making him human again.

New From Mehring Books

Leon Trotsky & the Post-Soviet School of Historical Falsification by David North

A review of two biographies of Trotsky by Geoffrey Swain and Ian Thatcher

Leon Trotsky (1879-1940) was the target of a vicious
campaign of lies by the Soviet Stalinist regime, which
culminated in his assassination in 1940. Nearly 70
years after Trotsky’s death, long-discredited
Stalinist falsifications are finding their way into
mainstream academic literature. David North raises
troubling questions about the integrity of the
historical scholarship in these two recent
biographies.

“David North’s essay is a very impressive piece of
work — detailed, meticulous, well-argued and
devastating in its criticism. He has done a great
service to Trotsky’s historical legacy.”
Professor Baruch Knei-Paz, author of The Social and
Political Thought of Leon Trotsky

Mehring Books, 2007, ISBN
978-1-893638-02-0, 96 pages, paperback

Marxism, History & Socialist Consciousness by David North

This polemical essay defends the foundations of scientific socialism against pseudo-Marxist conceptions prevalent among various philosophical tendencies influenced by the Frankfurt School and contemporary neo-utopianism.
Among the topics covered are the significance of the philosophies of postmodernism and pragmatism, the implications of the assault by modern irrationalism on the heritage of the Enlightenment, and the critical role of a historically-directed consciousness in the cognition and understanding of objective political reality. David North also offers perceptive evaluations of the works of such representative figures of neo-utopianism as Ernst Bloch, Hendrik de Man, and Wilhelm Reich.
This work is vital reading for those who wish to gain a deeper insight into the chasm separating Marxism and the various academically fashionable ideological trends.